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Monday, October 7, 2013

Criminal Sentence 660: Misplaced ducking

I was disappointed to read this awful sentence in the Wall Street Journal, in an article about how skateboarders are now free to ride around at closed national monuments:

"And now, after years of ducking the national park police that patrol these plazas, this week's closure of public buildings and easing of surveillance offered skaters hope of revisiting their favorite spots."

The problem here is that "this week's closure ... and easing of surveillance" (the subject) does not match up with the modifier at the beginning of the sentence ("after years of ducking the national park police..."). Skaters, not closure/surveillance, have been ducking the police for years.

There's no quick fix here because the sentence is trying to cram in too much. Any volunteers to write two sentences that are more coherent?

3 comments:

Not the best fix, just a rearrangement (and a bit of rewording):"And now, after years of ducking the national park police that patrol these plazas, skaters can hope to revisit their favorite spots with this week's closure of public buildings and easing of surveillance."

The sentence feels too stylized, using an effect-cause ordering to poor effect. My suggestion: "For years, national park police have patrolled these plazas, but this week's closure of public buildings and easing of surveillance offered skaters hope of revisiting their favorite spots."

Skermit, your rewrite is much more grammatical! :)Ben, I like yours too!Good job!Even better might be this:"For years, national park police have patrolled these plazas. Now that public buildings are closed and surveillance has eased, however, skaters hope to revisit their favorite spots."

About Me

I'm a copy editor and writer. I wrote The Curious Case of the Misplaced Modifier: How to Solve the Mysteries of Weak Writing, published in 2006 and now available in paperback. In 2007-2008, I wrote "The Sentence Sleuth" column for Writer's Digest magazine.